Sunderland estate agent strikes gold

The Sunderland city centre agency received the top accolade for sales and lettings for the North East at the prestigious Estate and Letting Agent Awards 2013 – for the second time.

The Gold awards were announced by TV property expert Phil Spencer, presenter of Location, Location, Location, at a ceremony at the Hilton Park Lane in London.

The awards, known as the Estas, see firms ranked by asking customers about the level of service they have received from their agent. This year, 23,000 questionnaires were completed.

“We are absolutely thrilled to have won the gold for both sales and lettings again this year, it’s truly fantastic to have won the double,” said Michael Hodgson.

“To be recognised year on year at the Estas means so much to myself and my team as we know it’s our customers who have judged our performance.

“We take our levels of customer service very seriously because we know clients have a choice and we aim to offer an extremely high level of care and expertise.

“We have always been very proud of the personal service we provide and winning two gold awards for both sales and lettings demonstrates how good we really are.”

Phil Spencer, who has hosted the Estas every year since their inception in 2004 said: “I think these awards help us all to focus on customer service for the greater good of our own businesses as well as the wider industry.

“We must all drive standards higher, raising the bar in terms of the quality of advice we offer and the level of customer care we deliver.”

Agents were shortlisted in 18 regions around the country.

Organiser Simon Brown said: “The competition is about recognising the hard work agents put in every day, every week and month of the year, so to be shortlisted is a great achievement, but to win is the highest accolade any agent can achieve”.